SECURITY experts on Thursday raised serious concerns over escalating digital threats targeting the Philippines and the Indo- Pacific region, saying cyber technology directly affects national defense, critical infrastructure, and geopolitical stability.
On the first day of the Pilipinas Conference 2025, Stratbase Institute president Prof. Victor Andres Manhit underscored the scope of emerging threats.
“Global assessments further highlight that misinformation, disinformation, and cyber espionage are among the most pressing risks of the coming decade. Cyber operations are increasingly sophisticated and disruptive, striking at the core of national security and public trust,” he noted.
Manhit emphasized the need for stronger, coordinated action across sectors. “Strong cooperation among government, industry, academe, and international partners is critical to building capabilities and responding effectively to cyber threats.”
Former National Intelligence Coordinating Agency (NICA) deputy director general Francisco Ashley Acedillo explained how state-linked foreign actors are integrating Philippine networks into broader intelligence systems.
“China, in particular, has developed a comprehensive approach to cyber operations that merges state, military, academic, and private sector capabilities,” he said.
Citing the KnownSec leak, Acedillo said the Philippines was explicitly listed among countries whose national networks were being mapped, categorized, and integrated into Chinese intelligence systems.”
He described this development as “a structured, persistent, and state-supported intelligence operation,” urging the creation of stronger national structures such as “a dedicated national cyber agency” or even “the Philippine Cyber Force.”
Maj. Gen. Fabian Pedregosa, Strategic Command chief of the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP), highlighted the national defense implications of rising cyberattacks. “As our world becomes even more digital, so too do the threats that challenge our national security, our critical infrastructures, and our way of life. Cyber resilience… has become a cornerstone of national defense,” he said.
Retired Maj. Gen. Cornelio Valencia Jr., assistant director general for Planning and Knowledge Management, and concurrent spokesman, and cybersecurity lead of the National Security Council, emphasized that cyberattacks now have real-world consequences.
“These are no longer ‘cyber incidents’—these are attacks with real-world impacts, capable of shutting down cities, destabilizing markets, or even endangering lives,” he said.
He also warned of rapidly increasing economic espionage, “We also see economic espionage evolving at a pace we’ve never experienced. Trade secrets, proprietary technologies, research data, and intellectual property are being extracted at industrial scale.”
Valencia stressed that cyber defense is now integral to national security planning. “In defense and security, cyber readiness is essential for protecting command-and-control systems, defense technologies, and the integrity of intelligence operations. Cybersecurity is now fully integrated into modern defense planning—because without secure digital infrastructure, even our most advanced capabilities are compromised,” he shared.
Dr. Koichiro Komiyama, director of the Global Coordination Division of the Japan Computer Emergency Response Team Coordinating Center, underscored the region’s dependence on submarine cables.
“Cyber resilience requires logistics. Repairing, maintaining, coordinating, and sustaining the infrastructure that keeps us connected, he said, adding that “outages, whether accidental or deliberate, can destabilize entire systems, and referenced European sabotage cases that led NATO to warn such attacks could trigger collective defense responses.”
According to him, the Japan–Philippines cable repair vessel is a vital capability, describing it as a “remarkable example of Philippine cooperation, which produces direct, measurable, and strategic impact.”
Komiyama recommended collaboration as the foundation of resilience. “Cyber resilience is built by people, Philippine engineers, Japanese partners, and of course, regional allies working together,” he said.
